hey! I am harvesting already.

Only one and a half month have passed and I am harvesting already. Yes, this gone Sunday I havested my first batch of Iceberg Lettuce, although it was not at the stage to be harvested but due to considerable hot weather it has started wilting and I dont want to let go what all I have left with. So here this is my first havest and I am proud of it, I think I havested in time,,,,,,,,, It looks so fresh and yes ofcourse it was scrumchuosly yummy, me, hubby and our son ate it without any seasoning:-------

We ate it within 15 minutes of harvest and it was yummy and I am hoping of one or two of more such harvest. I am wishing to collect some seeds too for the next year. Let us see. So these are some pic of lettuce on my roof top in the container--------->

Hmmmmmm..... I said "so these the lettuce and I can grow them in my garden".



This is the earliest pic of lettuce available with me, the earlier pics are lost some where in the jungle of my pics in my computer.



how a poor lil pigeon finally found a home!

On sunday 16th Jan I was shaping up some bamboo hedges  (I luckily found at my sis-in-law's backyard lying wastefully), i was shaping them in a form of greenhouse or you can say a hut, my son and nephew helped me in holding them and we came up with this structure,, yippee we were overjoyed, now this structure can support my zucchinies, bitter gourds and other bean's vines and its green cover will eventually save my other potted planted from scorching heat of April, may and june. So it came up like this:-

We feed grains to pigeons and all day through we have lots of pigeons around our house, my bade bhaisaheb put lots of wheat and bajra on the adjoining roof of waterworks near out house:-

we suddenly found an injured pigeon hiding himself between the water tanks, it was quite afraid, and was shivering too in the dry cold winds, so the kids gave him some grains and a bowl of water and my son placed my small terracota hut i purchased around diwali for my garden decoration near him and here he is:-

un occupied hut

now its occupied, cute

I think he will recover in two three days or shall i do something else for it? I think he has been hurt by some cat or by some electricity wire, there is no sign of blood though on his body. I will wait today and then tommorow if is not able to fly i will take him to Jain's birds hospital.

more updates on pigeon later,

In the mean while i have dug up bed for spinach, methi and more lettuce in the green belt , so now i have a bit of garden on earth's surface too, and preparing some more seed beds in the another side of green belt too. container gardening is indeed difficult till i get some considerable amount of soil up there for many more containers.

my pok choys are coming up real fast I think in two weeks time we will get to eat them and i am really excited this is the first time i am going to eat pok choy that too grown by me yeah!!!!!:-

my first produce pok choy  :)

one of round red radish

spinach and methi bed

i have planted 8-10 peas they are coming up very well, and as geek gardner wrote in his blog radishes are for impatient gardeners like me, they too are coming up real fast.

more later..

whats happening to my sword beans??????

Five days back I transplanted my first sword beans vines. they were a quite healthy looking seedlings with their first true leaves, for experiment sake I transplanted two plants in the same containers and one each in one container like this:-

so they were doing well till yesterday and yesterday in the morning i saw one of my sword bean plant wilted.
Actually i planted them in two different types of soil as is visible in the photograph above i did it for experiment sake. I dont know where to source my soil from, this is the major problem in Gurgaon. Now the above right one has wilted it has died. So it means this soil is not worth growing plants. I picked it from a construction site nearby so it will have to be totally discarded. May be owing to the shortage of soil i will give it another chance by mixing some cow manure and compost in it. I havent even added any compost in this soil because i have read that beans dont have any fertilizing needs. Lets us see.....
more next time.

Starting my Kitchen garden

Finally!!!

Was wishing to write all about my gardening endeavors. Today is the day. The last two to three weeks I have been very much immersed in to vegetable gardening info from net and different although few books available. Side by side started it too. Very much motivated by Geek Gardener’s container garden I am all set. Recently shifted to a bigger home with not one, not two but three terraces all to my self, I and my husband from last 5-6 months were spending our leisure time on purchasing and arranging and rearranging the ornamental plants for green and flowery surroundings, and then first thought of having some herbal plants in our garden and then thanks to googling got addicted to idea of growing vegetables at home! WOW, I thought organic homegrown vegetables and that too on the rooftop in containers without damaging the roof. I was all set on 15^th December 2010, and went to the seed shop that I was aware of, as far as nurseries in Gurgaon they do not sell vegetable seeds or transplants. So I purchased some hybrid tomatoes, long short and white brinjals, zucchini, cucumbers and sword bean seeds, lettuce, pok choy, celery, potatoes from a seed selling shop. I was a little disappointed when I tried to find about the variety and the determinate or indeterminate types but sadly it was not written on the seed ;packets available. So I came back happy with the seeds and showed it to everyone at home (we are a joint family) my seven year old son was especially excited to see white brinjals on seed packets (he happily promised to eat white brinjals once he will see them in our garden.) I had grown spinach, mustard, brinjal and methi before, but this is my first experience of container gardening. I wish myself all the luck.

So I prepared seedbeds in the old brass big dishes (called paraant in hindi)  :-

The weather is quite cold here and my enthusiasm just can’t wait so despite the shopkeeper and googled advices I have planted those seeds also which were to be sowed after the last frost date. So what I thought I will keep the baby plants indoors. Let us see.

The good news is all the seeds have germinated except zucchini (am waiting for you zucchini ji).

Pok choy were the first one to germinate then sem i.e. sword beans and then lettuce and after that one or two days here and there and I always have exciting news about new baby plants raising there heads in my garden. Wow it’s such a fulfilling and rewarding thing to do.

Now the new baby plants are like this:

This is pok choy---:   The winner.

The sword beans i.e. sem , came second giving me tremendous joy. My father once planted a sem creeper and that one creeper used to give us and neighbours too spontaneous supply of beans.

And then I waited and waited now have baby tomato plants, white, black brinjals but still waiting for zucchini, I think they are lying dormant. As the whether is quite chilling these days.

The Challenges before me:

1.      The weather of Gurgaon is quite an extreme one , too cold in winters and too hot in summers. I don’t know whether the plants will adapt on roof top or not.

2.      Whether I will achieve self-sufficiency and continuity or not.

3.      This is very tiring one, to take soil up there is quite tough, even asking the servants to take one or two bucket of mitti (soil) is a herculean task.

4.      I could not find any helpful shop from where I can get detailed info of the seeds I am sowing.

5.      I don’t know any of these growing mediums like coco-peat, vermiculite etc. and don’t exactly know where to look for them.

6.      Tried and called every source given by Geek gardener and fun gardener but still not know where to get my organic pesticide i.e. Panchgavya…….phew!!!

Any ways what ever the challenges, I have to do it and I want my home grown organic veggies,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, Come what may!!!!!!!!!!.

Oh yes, forgot to mention I planted some potatoes, some baby plants of chives cabbage and marigold too:-

The little plants were more than I expected so thought of breaking these old urns and using them for cabbage planting.

The one above are cabbages, I don’t know which variety, waiting and watching.

Planning to plant my tomatoes in between onions and cabbages for companion planting.

Oh yes! Watching his mom busy gardening or googling about gardening all these days my son has also picked up the hobby, and he demanded his portion in the garden, collected some bins from the attic ( he said he want to recycle and save earth) and planted his favourite rajma, orange and peas yesterday. This is his part of labour:-  J

The first two paint bins are for peas, the thermocoal bins have his rajma beans, and in the sack he has put his potatoes (he wants all his produce to be turned in to finger fries once they are out and this last bin has papaya seeds.

wishing all the luck to my baby plants weather here is damn spine chilling.